Summit Bancorp

Summit Bancorp was a Summit, New Jersey based bank, which also had offices in Chatham, New Jersey and Princeton, New Jersey.

The bank was established in Summit as The Summit Bank in 1891. In 1909, the bank reorganized as The Summit Trust Company. In 1953, the bank opened its first branch office in New Providence, New Jersey. In 1964, the bank merged with the Elizabethport Banking Company and became known as The Summit and Elizabeth Trust Company. The combined operation had six branch offices. In 1974, the bank formed a holding corporation, Summit Bancorp, which was headquartered in neighboring Chatham. In 1984, the commercial banking subsidiary reverted to the name The Summit Trust Company and, in 1993, reclaimed the name given to the original company, The Summit Bank.

Summit Bancorp slowly began expanding in the early 1990s, acquiring many regional banks in northern and central and New Jersey. In 1994, it acquired the Bankers Corporation and the Crestmont Financial Corporation, giving it over 100 branches in 11 counties in New Jersey. Then, in 1995, Summit Bancorp was acquired by the Princeton-based UJB Financial Corporation, the parent of Summit's rival, United Jersey Bank. UJB Financial adopted the Summit Bancorp name. After acquiring Collective Bancorp in 1997, Summit cemented its position as the largest bank in New Jersey. By 1999, after acquiring NSS Bancorp and New Canaan Bank and Trust Company in Connecticut and the Philadelphia-based Prime Bancorp, Summit had 500 branches in New Jersey, Connecticut, and eastern Pennsylvania.

In 2000, Summit Bancorp was acquired by FleetBoston Financial. Some of its branches were sold to Commerce Bank, and the company assumed Fleet's name after a transition period in 2001. The remaining Summit branches now either operate as TD Bank or Bank of America, which bought Fleet in 2005.